the day after the deadline: can the union survive brexit and other deep questions

are they so overconfident

apart from the ones that are mainly in it as a stick to beat Corbs & Co with as previously noted, i'm going with this in a kinda "the glass of our centrist lib goldfish bowl is really foggy" way

Really enjoying Jay Rayner (?!?!) tearing a strip of Tom Watson for not being there - even though Watson was a) paired and b) in hospital. Considering that Labour MPs literally entered the commons being wheeled in last time to vote because the government wouldn’t honour the nod through system, a bit of benefit of the doubt wouldn’t go astray here.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pair_(parliamentary_convention)#United_Kingdom

tho this^^^ says only in place for unimportant votes, but i don't know who gets to decide which are important and which aren't -- there was a fuss not that long ago, the vote when naz shah had to come in from her hospital bed, when the tory whips were accused of reneging on the usual practice? this is why i wondered if it had broken down entirely

obviously individual MPs can make agreements with their opposite numbers w/o the whips having to sign it off

multiple xp and my point made several times since for some reason it took me 15 mins to write accurately

They took such a lot of flak for that from normally pro-Tory sections of the press that I wonder if they haven’t quietly reinstated it.

Also great to see numerous actors and the like uncritically engaging with the “gender critical” crowd just because they’re anti Corbyn. Great to see lads, truly ye are the last defenders of liberalism.

i imagine they also get a lot of flak from MPs tbh, it's an entirely sensible cross-party practice which makes everyone's life easier, including the whips themselves

xp examples? like to keep my gulag spreadsheet up to date

Sure but they knew they’d get criticised by them when they did it and did it anyway. They probably didn’t see themselves starring in a twitter moment or being slagged off by the Times and the Sun.

It does leave a sour taste in the mouth to see FBPE March people shouting “where’s Jeremy Corbyn!” only several days after the Tory ‘rebels’ they lauded fell in line behind May yet again. As someone who voted Remain, it is utterly embarrassing and puts me off their cause.

— Calum Sherwood (@CalumSPlath) June 23, 2018

They took such a lot of flak for that from normally pro-Tory sections of the press that I wonder if they haven’t quietly reinstated it.

― gyac, Tuesday, July 17, 2018 4:11 PM (one minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I think I read somewhere that in the past when incapacitated MPs had to show up for tight votes it would normally be allowed for them to be driven into the HoC carpark and someone would come out to confirm their presence, but in this case they were made to actually go through the division lobbies, hence Naz Shah being pushed through in a wheelchair etc?

yes i think that's the fuss i'm actually thinking of: not a pairing issue exactly, tho a related cross-party convention re who counts as present

"Is this scenario worth risking?" is an odd question, as if this was something that all sensible people would fear rather than the cliff that the current lunatics are half-way through pushing us off.

Yes, “nodding through”. Stretcher vote most famously employee during the Maastricht votes iirc?

"this scenario" is the same cliff

albeit by a more intricate route

Yes, that's what I mean - possibly missing a comma after cliff.

Stephen Bush yesterday was saying 'you can't accuse Cameron of irresponsiblity and then back putting 'food shortages - y/n' on the ballot'. Three-way referendum is an awful idea but I assume the point is to split the Leave vote in two (something that Brexiters would very quickly cotton onto).

Don’t know you could argue for Remain in that instance if the two Leave votes > the Remain vote.

I know a few people who, having been not especially political before, were Corbynized and became his biggest fans and they are also fanatical and hysterical Remainers - something's got to give eventually.

starry eyed reactions to Anna Soubry from the usual crowd AGAIN

hey, at least she voted against this one. first time this much talked-up Tory anti-Brexit rebel has actually rebelled against Brexit?

but my foot is going to go through my monitor one of these days when I see the usual "ohh you're one of the good ones, you'd be very welcome in another party!" #FBPE stuff, because, nope

Consistently voted against raising welfare benefits at least in line with prices
Consistently voted against paying higher benefits over longer periods for those unable to work due to illness or disability
Consistently voted for a reduction in spending on welfare benefits

etc (theyworkforyou, which isn't up to date on Brexit votes, or I wouldn't need my question mark up there)

xps I wish the original ballot had offered some kind of fudging or at least clarity wrt the SM/CU questions, but if any new ref happens then a completely different counting method will be seen as moving the goalposts, surely? though Leave have moved their damn goalposts all over the place since the ref, of course ("nobody is talking about leaving the Single Market" etc)

The problem is the same as it was over two years ago - there’s barely been any shift in rhetoric or the arguments made and the polling suggests the same about voter attitudes. Another vote would be a horrible idea in this situation.

Stephen Bush yesterday was saying 'you can't accuse Cameron of irresponsiblity and then back putting 'food shortages - y/n' on the ballot'. Three-way referendum is an awful idea but I assume the point is to split the Leave vote in two (something that Brexiters would very quickly cotton onto).

I thought that most ppl were assuming some kind of single transferable vote thing for a three-way referendum - it's hard to see it being done of the basis of a plurality vote - trying to imagine a scenario where e.g. 'stay in the EU' gets 40%, 'May's deal' and 'no deal' get 30% each and we remain in the EU despite there now being two referendums where a majority voted for some form of brexit?

whatever Tory scum think of brexit, they can go fuck themselves forever for every ruinous, disabled killing, poverty enabling bill they've helped through in the last 8 years, and the ones in Labour as well tbf!

not especially political before, were Corbynized and became his biggest fans

This is a bit beside the point but it’s incredible more than a year after the election that people are still pushing the “voters only voted Labour begrudgingly cos they knew he wouldn’t win” line again - no less a source than the British Election Study found the exact opposite. People who thought labour could or would win a majority were more likely to vote Labour.

I mean, I know a few parties that that voting record would be welcome in at various times.

when I see the usual "ohh you're one of the good ones, you'd be very welcome in another party!" #FBPE stuff, because, nope

It kills me when they claim to be disgruntled Labour voters/ex-members when they carry on like this about people whose voting records would be anomalies in the actual Labour Party. Tells you what they’re in it for.

I think that trying to make that (very large) demographic choose between Corbyn and Remain is likely to be seriously counterproductive for Remain and anyone who's really pushing at that faultline is an idiot. But I'm pretty sure the Labour leadership understand that they can't afford to lose those voters - not that there's anywhere for them to go right now.

I'm sure that C+P doesn't really show the full hideous spectrum of the Soubry voting record, she's just as bad as most of them despite the moderate One Nation rhetoric iirc.

I have been trying to put something together about the English electorate's attitude to voting and fear and mistrust of anything except FPTP for ten minutes and am only just generating hissing - can I just call you all cunts and be done?

I used to think PR might be a scary prospect during periods of when UKIP type riff-raff start polling high, but when the Cons effectively became UKIP, idk - what difference does FPTP actually make?

"Almost always voted for higher taxes on alcoholic drinks"

Soubry's subhuman scum obv

any reform of the electoral system in isolation is going go be unsatisfactory

People who thought labour could or would win a majority were more likely to vote Labour.

I mean this is a statistically observable phenomenon in a lot of elections, where people are more likely to vote for the people they think are most likely to win. this hasn’t let a whole bunch of clod-headed centrist pundits try push the line that it’ll be different next time out as people see corbyn almost grasp power and will turn away from him at that point.... well, no... I mean, it likely will be different, in that this will likely multiply his vote not collapse it

it’s up there with the worst of their received punditocracy wisdom alongside “neck in neck in the polls with the worst govt in recent memory... chuka/yvette/ANYother would be twenty points ahead by now”. there’s been little (no?) good analysis done on exactly why the polls stay stubborn at 40 points a piece.

my hunch (starting to be confirmed by the recent poll showing a slide in the CON vote) is that a core 8-10 points of their lead is an entrenched UKIP which will start leaking as the brexit may drives through softens

any reform of the electoral system in isolation is going go be unsatisfactory

No, I completely agree. For example

Don’t know you could argue for Remain in that instance if the two Leave votes > the Remain vote.

except that this is the way a three-way system would work - if there are more people that would like to stay or would ideally like a soft Brexit, but would prefer staying to Chirpy Singapore, then that's what we'll get. And it's based on allowing people to answer more than one question at once, to get past the idea that offering anything more nuanced than "This one now, how long will I have to wait, I brought a thermos?" is indistinguishable from selling yourself down the river of "well, you expressed this choice..".

And the reason that reform won't by itself resolve the situation that you will still have to dice, boil or skewer the majority of the populace to stop their "But - I wanted the other one" shite.

i have noticed that when i drive my brexit through, any softening leads to leaks in the runup. particularly when it's REALLY entrenched

They might be further ahead with a leader with less baggage than Corbyn but definitely not from that wing of the party. Those voters would either be Tory Remainers or LibDems and I'm not sure any of them would be able to switch in sufficient numbers.

I suspect there are literally millions of people out there who are only voting Tory because of Brexit and that once it happens the party is likely to crumble into dust with the chalice in their hands.

FWIW I'm pretty sure I now believe the referendum should be rerun, in a large part because the idea that you can overspend by more than half a million and still basically get away will be disastrous for our democracy and can't be allowed to take hold. Fines certainly won't work.

keep the result but jail the fuckers

I mean definitely not with a leader from the Chuka / Yvette wing, to clarify.

there’s been little (no?) good analysis done on exactly why the polls stay stubborn at 40 points a piece.

Stephen Bush had a piece on this recently where he concluded that the mythical 20 points to be picked up couldn’t exist.

Meanwhile:

Reports that Tory rebels are being threatened with a general election if they defeat the government of a new clause 18

— PARLY (@ParlyApp) July 17, 2018

None of these fuckers are going to jail BTW.

I'm not entirely sure that I understand the Stephen Bush line that Matt quoted earlier - is it to say that asking "food shortages y/n" is irresponsible because what if the voters say 'y'?

Xp no I know I was just thinking outside the box

Or at least no one that matters is going to jail, and future poll fiddlers might conclude that the imprisonment of a few dumb fucks stupid enough to leave a paper trail is a price worth paying to get what they want.

Yeah but this government is so far short of the power or authority to demand a rerun that you might as well fantasize

It's becoming very apparent that they are far short of the power or authority required to pursue any of the available options.

I can no longer work out if headlines like 'May suffers surprise Brexit Commons defeat' are good or bad.

in case you're wondering which FIVE Labour MPs voted with the government - preventing an epic crisis in May's leadership - they are: Field, Hoey, Hopkins, Mann and Stringer

— Jim Pickard (@PickardJE) July 17, 2018

Poll on which one you like most.

I can't believe I haven't heard Hoey's dulcet tones reading any of my fave Audible books!